Hance the tenth commit for NU

Three-star offensive tackle Blake Hance became the tenth member of Northwestern's 2014 class on Thursday morning. With an excellent group gradually filling out, recruits have little time to wait.

Those "late-June" commits change to quick decisions when you love a school. Sometime between Wednesday evening–when Purple Wildcats spoke to Hance–and this morning his mind settled on NU.

Time is running out to join this party. Northwestern recruiting, and we can say this almost definitively, has never been this good. They're smart with selecting targets and quick to close. They endear themselves to the player and then capitalize.

"It's one of the places that's been around the longest," Hance said yesterday. "I've been able to build some really good relationships."

But don't get confused: This coaching staff must love Blake Hance. The Wildcats will likely take between 15 and 17 players, and even with space running out, they addressed the offensive line. That's not exactly an area of need.

Coaches Adam Cushing and Bob Heffner visited Hance on Tuesday to watch him work out at offensive tackle. Hance left them with no choice, so he added an NU offer.

Hance had already received offers from schools including Vanderbilt, Nebraska, Missouri and many others. This one stuck.

Chalk it up to recruiting momentum. The program knows what it wants, and is quickly assembling a class that has earned national attention.

"They've already got a very good class for my grade, and that's definitely impressive," Hance said. "That's definitely an attractive thing to me."